deKay

Titan Souls (Vita): COMPLETED!

Posted on 26/04/2015 Written by deKay

What a difficult game. Rewarding, complete with air punches, each time a Titan is finally felled, but oh so very difficult.

Almost every Titan I came across seemed impossible to defeat. At first it was because I couldn’t see how you were supposed to take them down, and then it was simply because I couldn’t. Perseverance paid off, and eventually each and every one was beaten. Eventually being the operative word there – so, so many attempts.

Most impossible of all the impossible Titans was the stone head with two maces. I think about a third of all my deaths were attributed to his spiky balls. There was a genuine sense of achievement and relief once I (literally) shot him in the back.

In comparison, the final two bosses were a walkover. As in, I “only” died around 20 times on each. In fact, the actual final boss himself took a mere handful of lives, although I think that may have been luck. Having dealt with him, it was Game Over and the credits rolled… but then I remembered: two Titans I’d attempted previously, I’d never gone back to finish off. How, then, did I get the end of game sequence?

As it turned out, some of the Titans are optional. I’d beaten the game taking out just 15 of them, but there are 18 to off. Mark Foster (who wrote the game) sent me a message on Twitter to say there was a “true” final boss after you’ve beaten every Titan, so my next mission is to find those I’d missed and mop the floor with them too. I did start this, and found (but lost many times to) the Knight With A Big Arrow Titan. I shall return.

Titan Souls (Vita)

Posted on 23/04/2015 Written by deKay

What seems like a long time ago, I heard about Titan Souls on the Pig Ignorant Indie Gamers podcast. Back then, it was a web based game written in about ten minutes for the Ludum Dare game jam. I played it, liked it a lot, and completed it.

Then it spent over a year being developed into a proper full game, and I eagerly awaited its release. And now it’s here!

It is, basically, the same as before. Only bigger. Instead of four titans (all of which appear to be in this) there are, er, lots. How many, I’m not sure. I’ve beaten twelve, and am able to access but not beat another two or three, and I’m guessing once I’ve beaten them and opened a massive door there’ll be at least another as a final boss. The game world is still quite small, but bigger than before with a few minor puzzles in it. There’s a jungle, some ruins, a snowy area, and a volcano to provide scenery variety too.

As before, the game is all about killing big bosses and very little else. You have just one weapon – a single arrow that, once fired, you have to pick back up. Alternatively, it can be magically summoned and levitated back to you, but this is slow and so mid-fight needs to be done carefully. Each boss makes use of this limitation, so you have to not only find the (generally) one-hit-kill weakspot, but figure out how to hit it.

For example, one titan is a giant mask who shoots energy balls at you. He flies round the room, always facing you, but his weakspot is his back. You can never directly shoot his back, but you can “pull” your arrow into it having shot it past him.

Most titans are as much a puzzle as a fight, so the first ten or so deaths (you’ll die a lot, sorry) are just figuring out where to hit them, and the rest figuring our how and then actually pulling it off. It’s hard. So very, very hard. And incredibly rewarding.

As I said, I’ve downed twelve of these bosses, and it’s taken me about three hours and I’ve died over 180 times. Has that put me off? Not at all.

Yakuza 4 (PS3)

Posted on 22/04/2015 Written by deKay

I’d not touched Yakuza 4 for a month or so, because various other games happened, but I’ve been playing it quite a bit in the last week or so and have been making a lot of progress.

Unlike Yakuza 3, you have more than one protagonist. So far, I’ve played as Akiyama – the ethical loan-shark who owns a hostess club – and kicked a lot of people in the face. Akiyama doesn’t go in for punches that much, it seems. Most of his story centres around protecting “Lily”, who he loans a massive sum of money to, and for reasons that don’t make a lot of sense, training her up as a hostess. All while trying to track down a guy who murdered another guy outside his office, and collecting locker keys.

After him, I played as Saejima – a prisoner on death row who escapes and tries to find out why his partner didn’t turn up for the murder spree 25 years ago that he got sent down for. As he escapes (plunging into the sea, injured), he’s told to find Kiryu, and in the most ridiculous turn of events ever, somehow literally washes up on Kiryu’s actual doorstep. He heads to Kamurocho to find ex-brother Majima, and along the way he helps two poorly cats, takes part in a fight to the death (in which neither combatant dies), spends far too much time at a massage parlour, and hangs around with homeless people in the sewers a lot. And goes bowling. And collects locker keys.

Currently, I’m playing a slightly bent cop Tanimura who is also trying to protect “Lily” (who turns out to be Saejima’s sister) because she knows something about why his dad, a detective, was murdered in relation to Saejima’s crimes, while both protecting illegal immigrants and taking “look the other way” money from their employers. While doing his police duties and additional vigilante work. And fighting random people, carrying “Lily”‘s money about in a steel briefcase and smacking a lot of Yakuza in the face with it. And collecting locker keys.

And that’s where I’m up to. I’ve just saved Tanimura’s Asian chums in Homeland from Katsuragi’s goons, and some police chief has turned up and wants a chat.

Basically, it’s quite complicated.

Azure Striker Gunvolt (3DS): COMPLETED!

Posted on 12/04/2015 Written by deKay

Aside from a couple of bosses, and the “water chasing you up the tower” level (which I realised I was doing wrong – you can wall jump and fall slowly when you’re sparking), I managed to get to the penultimate level of the game without too much trouble. Then I hit a wall.

A SuckySuck Bit(TM) wall. That’s right folks: a boss rush.

I suppose I was expecting it. After all, Gunvolt isa follow-up of sorts to Mega Man, and Boss Rushes are a Mega Man cliché. And it was hard, too. After scraping past the first boss, there was a second one. I was praying it was just the two, or at least that there’d be a restart point after the first, but no – straight into the second boss without so much as a heal or recovery of your skill points. So I died.

And I died a lot. Over and over. Mostly on the second boss (the green one with the spikes that turn into drills or lasers). I decided to go back and complete a few earlier levels again, to level up (I went from about 24 to 35 in the end) but also to get material to generate better gear for Gunvolt – such as faster EP recovery or better shielding. After that, I returned to the boss rush and seemed to be faring little better.

Then, on one attempt, I beat the second boss with a tiny sliver of health left, no skill points, and no chance at all of defeating a third boss. Please don’t be a third boss. Oh. There’s a third boss.

Thankfully, somehow, I wiped him out in double-quick time. One skill point regenerated soon after the fight began and I used it to replenish some health. Luckily the boss was the one who creates columns of fire on either side of the screen, and he was really easy. Phew! But… a fourth boss?

No. Well, yes, but not before a restart point. And other boss after that, again with a restart point that went unused as they were easy. Onto the final level!

After a short corridor and a room with loads of simply to defeat minions, it was the final boss. Who was really difficult. It took many, many attempts to see him off (then of course, I realised all I needed to do was use my EV shield to negate his shield, making him much easier) and he changed form into a huge robot thing. Sigh – another Irritating and Unnecessary Gaming Cliché. More so in that he appeared to be impossible to beat, and one attack (which blows you off the platform seemingly with no way to avoid it prevent it) was incredibly frustrating.

Many attempts, requiring the previous form to be beaten again first, were had, and then I realised the “trick” – target the left and right sides of the robot, then use your EV shield to negate his shield in the middle, then target that, then spark all three targets at once. Knowing that, he went down quickly. The end!

Except the end wasn’t a happy end at all. Spoilers, obviously, so I won’t say what happens, but I think you need to do something before the final boss. Probably involving collecting gems, of which I think there are six, and I stumbled across one. More to do then!

Azure Striker Gunvolt is a fantastic game, and I’m pleased they’ve announced a sequel already as I do really want to play more of this sort of thing!

Super Mario 64 (Wii U): COMPLETED!

Posted on 07/04/2015 Written by deKay

Look, there’s not lots to write about this that I’ve not written before. Super Mario 64 is one of the best games ever made, on any system, ever. That’s just a fact, and playing it through again did nothing to dissuade me. Of course, I’m still not sure if Super Mario 64 is better than New Super Mario Bros U, or if it’s the other way round, but I can be sure the two of them are at positions 2 and 3 in The Best Games Ever.

The Wii U Virtual Console version is barely different to the Wii Virtual Console and the N64 original, but the graphics seem a little sharper (probably only because it’s now HDMI rather than any changes Nintendo have made) and of course the buttons have moved on the Wii U Gamepad. I moved A and B to B and Y though, so it’s more like an N64 pad, and didn’t have any issues – it feels just the same as it did before.

One addition is the availability of save states, which was useful as I didn’t need to pause the game for hours if I needed to do something else. Oh, and you can take screenshots now, obviously.

Is it just me, or is the game now significantly easier, though? In particular, on previous playthroughs, I’m sure I struggled on at least one of the Bowser levels and getting 100 coins on Rainbow Ride in the past, but no such issues this time. In fact, I’ve had very few deaths at all, all things considered. Maybe I’m just a lot better than I thought. Yes. That’s bound to be it.

Even after nigh on 20 years, Mario 64 is still gorgeous to look at, listen to (the tunes are probably more memorable that pretty much any Mario game since – or any game since, perhaps) and play. The controls are slick, Mario leaps and flips and dives in a fluid way no other game, not even later Marios, has ever managed. It’s an utter joy from start to finish.